Artery. A podcast on art, authorship and anthropology · Artery. A podcast on art, authorship and anthropology

Adèle Commins and Daithí Kearney with Kayla Rush

·57 min·3 clips

A tune called Roslyn Castle turns out to be probably by James Oswald, not anonymous.

1. Artery’s episode with Kayla Rush centers on authorship, art music, and Irish traditional music in County Louth. 2. Kayla Rush is an assistant lecturer in music at Dundalk Institute of Technology, while Adele Cummins and Deithi Kearney are music scholars, composers, and performers at DKIT. 3. The episode asks what authorship means when traditional tunes, classical arrangements, and community performance overlap. 4. Kayla opens with the old musicology distinction between art, popular, and folk traditions, then says her students and colleagues in DKIT make that boundary feel unstable. 5. Deithi uses Roslyn Castle from Pádraig i Ní Uilacháin’s A Hidden Ulster to show how a tune can circulate anonymously even when James Oswald was probably the composer. 6. Adele brings in Charles Villiers Stanford, Songs of Old Ireland, Songs of Aaron, and the George Petrie collection from 1902 to 1905. 7. Stanford’s Irish Symphony from 1887 appears as an example of a composer using Irish idioms, folk melodies, and a jig-like movement on the concert stage. 8. Deithi then describes Sean O’Riada’s 1959 score for Mise Éire, built around Róisín Dubh, and O’Riada’s insistence that it was an arrangement rather than his own composition. 9. The discussion moves to Bill Whelan and Riverdance in 1994, where authorship is stated openly instead of being folded into tradition. 10. Kayla adds Thin Lizzy’s recordings of Róisín Dubh and Whiskey in the Jar, plus Metallica’s heavy-metal version of Whiskey in the Jar, to show further movement across genres. 11. Adele says she feels a strong responsibility to tradition because of classical training, early teachers in Dundalk, and a childhood in traditional music. 12. She names Rory Kennedy and Brian O’Kane as teachers who emphasized swing, steady beat, danceability, and traditional sound. 13. Deithi calls some of Adele’s tunes conservative, while Adele says she is the one who likes syncopation, unusual keys, and key changes. 14. Adele describes The Old Schoolhouse, a jig shaped by a COVID-era walk past a schoolhouse and by old copybooks and the folk song Bodgy and Islami. 15. Deithi explains that 7-8, 11-8, and 13-8 became useful teaching tools because they challenge students and open a discussion about pulse, beat, and dance. 16. The conversation on rhythm includes Deithi’s “rashers and sausages” count for 6-8 and his explanation that 7-8 splits into two twos and a three. 17. The tone is collaborative and interview-based, with Kayla steering the questions and both guests answering in a practical, classroom-minded register. 18. Musical examples and spoken explanations dominate the format, and the episode repeatedly shifts between scholarly reference, composition practice, and live ensemble work. 19. Listeners interested in Irish traditional music, composition, and cultural history. 20. Listeners wanting light entertainment without musical detail.

As heard by us

A thoughtful music conversation where rhythm, dance, and identity stay closely connected.

Artery follows a practice-room conversation about Irish traditional music and keeps its focus where it belongs: on rhythm, composition, dance, and the move from ceilidh culture toward listening culture.

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Why you'd press play

For when you want Irish traditional music explained from the inside, note by note.

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